(Clearwisdom.net) I have been an elementary school teacher for 24 years. I had hoped to realize my dream through teaching. But instead, from a confident and happy young man I became a person full of frustration. Happily, this situation turned around completely in October 2004, when I began practicing Falun Gong.
When I was young I was hard working and diligent in my job and full of joy when I was around unsophisticated pupils. But I found that the CCP cadres in our school were far from the model depicted by the propaganda. They were using their positions to benefit themselves. They were arranging posh positions at the school for their family members and relatives, while other, more capable, teachers without contacts were refused. Their family members and relatives were at the top of the list for salary hikes or promotions. They were even forging the student's exam records, since the student's exam records are used to evaluate the teacher's skills. At one time, my class scored top place in an exam, but a relative of the school's principal got the benefits.
I got very angry and frustrated. I wasn't enthusiastic anymore, but I couldn't give up my job and let down my students. Even more provoking, higher-up CCP cadres embezzled the school's money, didn't allow independent voices and were confusing right and wrong. I usually argued with the schoolmaster because I couldn't endure all these phenomena. Accordingly I was frequently blamed and criticized out of the blue.
I lost my health because I was angry, furious and frustrated. I couldn't live and work normally. Living in this environment with these kinds of work relationships, full of strife openly and secretly, I ruined both my body and mind. Every now and then I would enter my class with an exhausted body. I was lost on the path of life. I had fallen into a painful abyss from which I couldn't pull myself out.
This situation changed only in October, 2004, when I started practicing Falun Gong. Like a lost sailor that finds the lighthouse, I suddenly enlightened that cultivation practice is the path I should follow and "Truthfulness, Compassion and Forbearance" is the criteria I should abide by. My heart has been lightened. I do not complain over the personal loss and gain anymore, I am no longer indignant over the wickedness around me, and I do not struggle for fame and profit anymore. Instead I strive to be a good person in society. Bit by bit, I tried to be more and more forbearing, and I became positive and extroverted again. School should be a pure land in this murky society, but it too has been eroded and contaminated. I deeply understand that only by cultivation practice can we find true heaven.
Great changes also took place in my body. I feel like I'm walking on air. The diseases I have been suffering from are gone. I do not need any medicine. My colleagues also say that I am full of youthful spirit and energy. Sometimes I keep wondering how come I didn't meet Falun Gong earlier. I would have avoided a lot of pain for my body and mind. But then I think: it's not too late for me; am I not already on the road back to one's true self?
I really appreciate Falun Gong from my heart - it saved my body and spirit. I practice the exercises every day and keep studying the book Zhuan Falun. I will continue to get rid of my bad habits and temper and I will cast off my ordinary people's attachments. I will do my best in my job and serve my students without complaints. Furthermore, I will continue to follow the way of cultivation practice unhesitatingly.
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